Packaging units of this kind, mainly made from a plastic material, are known in the state of the art for packaging a wide variety of different products, including sweets.
Although the main purpose of such packaging units is to hold the goods concerned, products are also known on the market and from the state of the art which at the same time offer an additional benefit, namely in order to be used as an assembly construction kit for children. U.S. Pat. No. 5,447,249, for example, discloses containers with interlocking parts at the upper and lower ends of the container, which can be connected together. This kind of container, however, requires the possibility of undertaking considerations regarding the shape and/or appearance of the container, in order to provide the additional functionality, which increases the effort and expense involved in production, and the aesthetic appearance is impaired.
In some local markets, packaging units for sweets are sold which make it possible to connect the containers together so that they can be used as assembly construction kits for children once they have been emptied, and are provided with floor sections in two different shapes, one shape facilitating the insertion of the floor section into the open end of another container and the other shape making it possible to connect the floor section to the inside of the cap of another container. For this purpose, if it is intended to insert the floor section of the container into the open end of another container, the diameter of the floor section is reduced, but is provided, at the lower end, with an outwardly extending rim. Alternatively the diameter of the lower end is somewhat larger than the diameter of the rest of the container and is provided with a circular groove so that it fits over a corresponding circular rim on the inside of the cap. To illustrate this more clearly, drawings of such prior-art containers are provided in the attached FIGS. 1 and 2. The two types of container cannot be exchanged for one another in use, i.e. those containers whose floor sections fit into the open end of another container cannot be used to be connected to the cap of that container, whereas those containers whose floor sections are designed such that they can be connected to the inside of the cap, cannot be inserted into the open end of another container. The disadvantage of this system is that a consumer wishing to use the container as an assembly construction kit for children needs a sufficient number of both types of containers, in order for this additional benefit to be possible.
The problem underlying the present invention is therefore to provide a packaging unit of the above-mentioned type, offering complete flexibility in the use of the empty packaging units as assembly construction kits for children.
This object is achieved by a packaging unit of the above-mentioned type in which a floor section of the container body adjacent to the lower end thereof is designed such that said floor section can be inserted, to a predetermined extent, into the open end of another packaging unit, and means are provided for optionally alternatively connecting the floor section of the container body to the cap of another packaging unit.